


Five Times Klaus Copes On His Own

by waterandsilver



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: (warning for some brief references to suicide that are not related to klaus), 5+1 Things, Abandonment, Addiction, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Child Abuse, Drug Use, Gen, Hurt Klaus Hargreeves, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Klaus Hargreeves Whump, Reginald Hargreeves' A+ Parenting, Sibling Bonding, Trauma, With some fluff at the end, alllllll of the angst, no beta we die like ben
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-14
Updated: 2019-08-14
Packaged: 2020-08-31 23:37:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20248519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waterandsilver/pseuds/waterandsilver
Summary: And one time his siblings are there for him.





	Five Times Klaus Copes On His Own

**1**

It’s not actually the ghosts that scare him, at first, when his father throws him into that mausoleum. It’s not the dark, either. It’s not even the cold, although the cold _is_ something awful, biting at his skin, making him shiver down to his bones.

No: it’s the silence that scares Number Four. The heavy stone door slams shut in a cloud of dust, and silence, pure _silence_, washes over him like ice water.

He isn’t used to this. He feels his way into the back corner and draws his arms around himself. This doesn’t… feel right. He’s Number Four: middle of the dinner table, middle bed, middle of the line-ups when they do those stupid photoshoots. There’s always a sibling at either elbow, someone poking into his space, someone chattering into his ear. Number One shoving him out of his way impatiently; Five rolling his eyes; Seven with her staring.

His own breathing sounds too loud, his own heartbeat too lonely.

So Number Four pretends that he’s not alone. He pretends that Number Six is there. He thinks up games that the two of them can play to pass the time. He pretends so hard that when, suddenly, he is not alone anymore, he thinks for a while that he’s still imagining it. The cold breath against his cheek; the way the air in the room drops another few degrees. He thinks it’s still in his head.

But then he looks up and sees hollow black eyes sockets and a drooping mouth above him. Then he feels the scrape of fingernails that aren’t his own against his skin, and Number Four starts to scream.

Dad doesn't open the door again until morning.

**2**

The next time he finds himself alone, he has a name. He’s Klaus, he’s seventeen, and he’s fucked up.

The mission isn’t even that difficult. Not for his siblings, anyway. It’s a high security hostage situation with a dozen police cars outside. Easy-peasy. Nothing they haven’t done before. Luther waltzes into the building like he’s invincible, and Diego charges straight in after him. Allison is too old for skipping these days, but her smirk gets smugger and more self-assured with every passing year. Ben, on the other hand, is quieter and quieter every day; he looks more tired each time he puts on the mask, and sometimes Klaus thinks he’s the only one who notices. But Ben isn't scared. None of Klaus’ siblings are ever scared. What would they be afraid of?

Klaus is the only one who has anything to fear. Because bringing Klaus along on missions like this is pointless, and they all know it. Despite the many creative ways that Reginald Hargreeves has tried to prise his abilities into life, Klaus is still about as capable of harnessing spirits as Vanya is capable of bringing the Academy toppling down on their heads. He’s useless. He knows that the others would choose to bench him, if it weren’t for their father’s strict rule that everyone has to go on every mission; no exceptions.

(Five is gone. Disappeared without a trace. None of them talk about it.)

They split up to find the hostages and apprehend the criminals who are holding them. Klaus pairs up with Ben as always, but then Ben disappears behind a door to take out a roomful of goons, and Klaus, knowing that he _definitely_ doesn’t want to get in Ben’s way for this, stays behind.

That’s when one of the bad guys finds him.

Klaus is no Luther, but he’s not a _complete_ deadweight. He can hold his own in a fight. Up until a point, you know. At the very least, he’s a quick thinker, and he thinks quickly now as he grabs the nearest chair and hurls it at Bad Guy #23. Unfortunately for Klaus, Bad Guy #23 is pretty built, and it only seems to piss him off. And Bad Guy #23 is armed with a knife, not a chair.

Klaus feels the breath being knocked out of him as he’s body-slammed into the wall. After that, he must black out for a while, because the next thing he knows, Bad Guy #23 is gone and Klaus is on the floor with an impressively large puddle of blood collecting underneath him.

“Jesus Christ,” he cries, although it comes out as more of a whimper. At least he can still feel his communicator in his ear. “Uh, guys? Could r-really use some help here.”

“Little busy right now, Klaus.” Diego’s teeth sound gritted. Klaus can hear his knives swish-swish-swishing in the background.

Luther only grunts in reply, and Allison says something about how he _Should have kept to the side-lines like they practiced blah blah blah, blahblahblahblah_. Klaus isn’t really listening. He can’t really process long sentences right now. He tries to move, which was a Certifiably Bad Idea. He thought he knew what pain was when he broke his leg, or when he got in between one of Luther and Diego’s cat fights that happened to be occurring at the top of a flight of stairs, or when he got caned. But this – this really takes the cake. Yep, getting stabbed sure does hurt. Who would've thunk it.

Luther might have been able to walk it off. And shit, that little chicken knife wouldn’t have even touched Ben in all his eldritch-monster glory. But Klaus – nope, Klaus is not getting up from this one. Klaus is fine right here on the floor.

He thinks he might be dying.

“Okay,” he mutters to himself, blinking away the stars that are collecting over his vision, and also the sudden wetness in his eyes. He can practically see Reginald’s eyes rolling; Dad always hates it when they cry. “We can do this, Klaus. We’re gonna be juuuust fine.” The blood escaping from his side spurts in disagreement. Klaus clenches his jaw. “What – you’re really gonna let a little stab wound kill you, huh? Nope. Nuh-uh. Not today, motherfucker.”

He manages to draw himself into a sitting position against the wall, somehow. He’s had the chorus of _Don’t Stop Me Now_ in his head for days, and he starts to hum it from the beginning as he presses his shaking hand down over the wound. He doesn’t know how long he spends there, listening to the sounds of his superpowered siblings fightin’ the good fight over his communicator. He’s long forgotten what this stupid mission was about. Lately, all their missions have been stupid. None of them are worth dying over. But it’s not like Klaus has a choice in the matter, is it? Not like _any_of them did.

An awful thought occurs to Klaus, just as his vision starts spotting with black. Maybe… maybe this was Dad’s intention, sending him on these missions. Either Klaus unlocks his powers in the midst of battle, or he gets killed in the process. The thought hurts, hurts as much as the wound in his side. Could it be true? Is his father really such a cold-hearted son of a bitch that he’d rather have a dead kid than a useless one?

Klaus is pretty delirious by the time they find him. Ben’s face, swimming before his eyes, seems to turn three shades paler when he sets eyes on Klaus. He hears a softly whispered _Shit, Klaus, a_nd then he feels gentle arms wrap around him.

He’s on morphine for a week. If he’s honest, it’s probably the best week he’d had in years, lying in bed with an IV drip pumping the good stuff into his system. While he’s high off his seventeen-year-old ass, there’s no ratty grey woman wailing into his ear about her dead children. There’s no spirit-of-the-week staring at Klaus with dead eyes from the corner of the room. There is quiet in his brain for the first time in _years_, and it’s fucking _luxurious_ for Number Four.

Ben dies two months later. Klaus packs his bag the same night.

**3**

Solitary is a bitch. Solitary is the biggest bitch he’s ever known, and Klaus has known some bitches in his time. He manages to avoid it during his brief stint in prison (although he’s so doped up during that whole period of his life that he doesn’t really remember all that much) but he gets put in solitary twice while he’s in rehab. An actual fucking padded room, with truly disgusting grey drab walls. It’s an absolute bitch.

Klaus sings. When there is no response, he sings louder, more off-key, hoping for someone, anyone, to yell at him, even if it's just telling him to shut the fuck up. If he pulled that shit in prison, he’d be black and blue. But rehab isn’t prison. This rehab, especially, is a fucking sad one. In here, everyone is too busy drowning in their own misery to care that Klaus is absolutely butchering _Bohemian Rhapsody_.

The spirit makes herself known as withdrawal sets in. He’s been glimpsing her in the corner of his eye ever since he was admitted, a couple of weeks ago. He’s kept her at bay so far with the pills he’s been getting in exchange for blowing his social worker in the laundry room. But now his hands are trembling and he’s sweating very unattractively; a familiar metallic smell is searing the back of his nose, and a brown-haired girl is sitting cross-legged on the other side of the room, looking about as miserable as Klaus feels.

The sad spirits fuck him up. The angry ones aren't fun either. But they get kind of repetitive, after a while. Yeah okay, we get it, you were murdered, taken before your time, and now you’re gonna take it out on Klaus because he’s the only one who can see you, whatever. Sometimes, it’s too melodramatic to take seriously. But the sad ones – fuck, they actually get to him, sometimes. This spirit sniffles so _quietly_. He tries not to look at her too closely, tries not to see the dripping wounds on her inner arms. He could reach out to her, but what would he say? It’s not like he knows how to take care of a depressed ghost. Hell, he doesn’t even know how to take care of a depressed Klaus. That’s why he’s here. And the sad ones can turn angry real quickly, when Klaus says the wrong thing.

He counts the ceiling tiles. Counts the number of dents in the wall between the bed and the toilet. When the withdrawal _really_ hits, he takes those deep breaths that therapists are always telling him about (vastly overrated, in Klaus’ opinion), and he thinks. Klaus thinks about the games he used to play with Ben as a kid, during their allotted hour of play. He retraces his own steps in hide-and-seek. Klaus always used to win. Ben was a lousy hider. He always chose the tapestry on the second-floor hallway, or the space on the far side of Vanya’s desk, or the boiler closet in the kitchen. He would pout when Klaus found him, like he hadn’t chosen the most vanilla hiding spots in the entire mansion. At least Klaus had some flair. Sure, he went without dinner for a week after he prised the panels from the wall in Reginald’s office to hide inside. But it was worth it for the look on Ben’s face, the way his eyes grew as big as dinner plates with awe.

Klaus could kiss the security guy who eventually comes and fetches him, when his time in there is done. He doesn’t, though. He wouldn’t want to make his beloved social worker jealous.

“Well, that place was a shit hole, huh?” he says to Ben, when he finally gets out of that sad excuse for a rehab center. He… doesn’t actually know when Ben appeared. Somewhere between getting out of solitary and getting out of the center? Huh. Suddenly, Ben is simply there at Klaus’ side, rolling his eyes as Klaus throws his 30 Days Sober chip into the gutter.

**4**

In Vanya’s book, she writes about Number Four. How he was _supposed_ to be able to summon the dead. How he couldn’t.

“Got that wrong, huh?” Klaus grins, raising a bottle of vodka in a toast to his long-dead brother, who is reading over his shoulder.

Vanya mentions the mausoleum exactly twice. To her credit, there are no details about what it entailed (probably because she didn’t know; none of his siblings ever did), and she does spill just about everyone’s secrets in that book of hers, not just Klaus’. Not even Pogo is safe from her Gossip Girl antics.

It still makes him feel queasy. Of course, the Academy had its fair share of snooping journalists. But this is different. This isn’t just speculation. These are their secrets, _his_ secrets, the worst parts of their childhood printed in paper and ink for the world to read. It makes him feel exposed, and it takes a lot to make Klaus feel like that these days, considering he’s been arrested for public indecency twice.

Klaus doesn’t pick up his phone until he’s finished the vodka and he is really, truly drunk.

None of them answer.

And. Okay. Maybe he can’t exactly blame them. Klaus knows that he’s sort of an asshole. The last time he saw Allison, she gave him rent money, and then threw a bitchfit when she found out that it didn’t exactly go towards rent. When Luther heard about it, he threw Klaus across a room and said he'd put his head through a wall if he pulled a stunt like that with Allison again. Maybe Klaus shouldn’t have done that. And maybe he shouldn’t have stolen Luther’s watch either – but hey, his _life_ was being threatened, and those bruises had lasted _weeks_. He deserved a little compensation, right?

At least Klaus still has Ben. Except… he doesn’t. Not really. Ghost-Ben is a lot of things that Living-Ben used to be. He’s still whip-smart, level-headed, sarcastic. He is _good_ in a way that Klaus could never be. But he’s dead. Klaus can’t bury his head in Ghost-Ben’s shoulder. Ghost-Ben can’t smooth down Klaus’ hair like he used to do when they were kids, when Klaus would throw up from nightmares of stone tombs and nails at his throat.

Klaus has always needed touch, needed to _be_ touched, like he needs oxygen. That’s half the reason he ends up taking off his clothes in dark apartments with people he doesn’t know. There has always been a scream trapped inside him that needs to be soothed, calmed, quietened, or it will come flooding out of his mouth, and Klaus knows that if he ever starts screaming, he’ll never stop.

But Klaus can’t call any of his regular hook-ups tonight. He’s generally got the “functioning” part of functioning alcoholic down pat, but even he’s too drunk for that tonight. If he called someone, they’d be expecting a good time, and Klaus doesn’t trust himself not to end up crying into their shoulder and humiliating himself instead.

So Klaus fetches another bottle, ignores Ben’s disappointed look, and makes no more phone calls.

**5**

He probably runs into Diego the most, around the city. Vanya is lying low after the whole book thing, and Klaus doubts that he’d end up running into her all that much anyway. From what he’s seen of Vanya’s adult life, they don’t tend to run in the same circles. Him and Allison end up at the same party once or twice when she's back in town, but she avoids him. She has a reputation to uphold, and there’s no place in her swanky new image for a thieving, junkie little brother. Luther seems to have disappeared off the face of the Earth (literally, Klaus will later learn, which is fucking hilarious), so apart from his dearest and deadest brother (who remains at his side no matter how high he gets), yeah, it’s probably Diego.

Klaus is an alleyway – he’s a walking cliché, he knows, he knows – when Diego comes across him this time. Klaus doesn’t really remember how he got there, but he knows that the shoes he’s wearing definitely don’t match, which is weird. They’re totally from different pairs. He’s been staring at them for about an hour, and he has come to that conclusion.

“Klaus?”

It takes him a few moments to realise that the voice saying his name is a) real, and b) not Ben.

Diego still wears a mask. Not the domino mask that they used to wear as kids. He’s gotten rid of the ridiculous white eye-piece (costume design, much like parenting, was never Reginald’s forte) and he’s long grown out of the school uniform. No, he wears a black leather get-up these days. It’s a little too Daredevil for Klaus’ tastes, but it does wonders for Diego’s ass.

Nevertheless, the sight of the black mask throws Klaus off. For a second, he’s fourteen again, struck with the spine-jerking urge to get up off the floor and slap on his own mask before he gets his ass beat for holding the team up and making them late to the mission.

“Klaus?” Diego says again, frowning down at him in a dirty alleyway in 2016, and Klaus comes back to the present day. The amount of worry creasing Diego’s face almost makes him feel offended. Klaus knows he’s not looking so hot these days; the last time he caught sight of his own reflection, he almost mistook himself for one of the ghosts. But still, Klaus doesn’t think he looks bad enough to warrant _that_ level of concern from the most stoic of his brothers, who, when he found Klaus’ coke in his underwear drawer at sixteen years old, simply pulled a face and told Klaus to keep his shit on his own side of the room.

“Hey, brother,” says Klaus, offering up a grin. “Where’s the fire?”

Diego is clearly on his way to save some helpless soul from the forces of evil. He has that tension in his shoulders, when he’s in the middle of an emergency. Klaus can hear sirens, vaguely, in the distance. Unlike Klaus, Diego still does this kind of thing. (Of course, unlike Klaus, he was actually good at it in the first place.) Yes, Diego was clearly on his way to doing some top-quality superhero-ing. But now he’s stopped in his tracks, and he’s staring down at Klaus like he’s never seen a semi-conscious drug addict in an alleyway before. Amateur.

“What are you doing here? I thought you were supposed to be in rehab.” He looks Klaus up and down. “Where are your clothes?”

Klaus glances down, and discovers that he doesn’t have a shirt. He has pants, so his decency isn’t _completely_ tarnished. And he has shoes that come from two different pairs; he hasn’t forgotten about them.

He lets his head fall back. The pills that he took earlier tonight – that’s right, there were pills; there was a party; he’s remembering now – aren’t his usual gig. Whatever they are, they’ve knocked it out of him. He doesn’t want to talk; he just wants to close his eyes and let the current take him.

“Klaus?” Diego hesitates. “Are you… okay?”

“Mmm. Yeah. Peachy.”

“You’re high.”

“Your skills of observation will win many awards.”

He’s slurring. Ugh. Klaus sighs – and then he has to catch himself from falling, as the alleyway shakes beneath him. Diego doesn’t fall, but his head jerks up, gazing over the rooftops. Oh yeah, that was definitely an explosion.

“That’s your call, isn’t it?” Klaus can’t seem to get upright again. His body is _heavy_. He just wants to sleep. He expects Diego to take off, but he doesn’t. His weight shifts from one combat boot to another, but they remain planted in the alleyway. “Go on. Don’t you have a… a kitten to rescue from a tree, or something?”

Another explosion, this one making the trash cans on the other side of the alley jump a foot in the air.

“Big kitten,” says Klaus, and laughs at his own joke.

Diego still doesn't move. Klaus sees his brother chewing his lip. Behind him, from a nearby stair railing, Ben watches the exchange. Suddenly, although there’s no blood relation, Klaus thinks he sees a flash of resemblance between them, the same something gracing both of their faces.

“Look, do you have somewhere to go? Someone you can call?”

Klaus sighs again, dramatically. “What is this, an intervention? I’m _fine_. Told you, ‘m peachy. Jesus, can’t even take a nap in this city without somebody – somebody _interrogating_ you about your life choices.” And then, because he’s high, and what little brain-to-mouth filter he possesses is not currently in operation- “Not like any of you pick up when I call, anyway.”

Diego almost looks wounded. Almost looks like he actually cares. Then there's a third explosion, and he curses.

“Shit. I really need to go… look, Klaus, I know we maybe don’t talk as much as we used to. But I’ll come back after I’ve dealt with this, okay? Just…” His eyes run Klaus up and down once again. “Just stay safe. I’ll be back.”

“Okay. Whatever.” Klaus, who has _finally_ gotten himself upright, and is ready to pass the fuck out, waves his hand. “Go get that kitten.”

“I’ll come back,” Diego echoes, and then takes off down the alley.

Klaus listens to his footsteps until they peter out into silence.

“No,” says Klaus. “You won’t.”

Up on the railing, Ben looks away.

**+**

The end of the world is _exhausting_. Klaus always thought it would be a hasty kind of event. A nuclear bomb going off or an asteroid falling out of the sky, mercy-killing them all. But apparently, for the Hargreeves siblings, the end of the world has to be as dramatic and complicated as everything else in their lives. It’s their new day job, after they fuck it all up with Vanya the first time: preventing the apocalypse, take two.

For Klaus, it involves a lot of sitting at the side and trying not to space out while his siblings put their heads together. Sure, he conjured Ben during the fight, but he’s still barely any closer to “mastering his potential”, or whatever Dad called it, so he’s about as useful to the group as he was before. They have a genius to come up with their plan, and five superpowered individuals, who are actually in control of their powers, to put it into action.

“You’d be more in control if you _practiced_,” Five has told him pointedly, several times.

Which is unfair, because Klaus _is_ practicing. He’s stood for hours, him and Ben straining so hard they both look and sound constipated, trying to channel his brother’s ghost again. It’s just not working.

“Maybe in time,” Vanya says quietly.

And – well, yes, Klaus supposes she would know about this kind of thing, more than most. Vanya didn’t even know she had powers at all until a few weeks ago. She’s back on the drugs now. They gave them to her crushed up while she was unconscious (Allison tried to protest; she was overwhelmingly outvoted) and when she woke up, her eyes were brown again. Vanya is back on the drugs, and Klaus is off them. He’s clean, properly clean, _weeks_ clean.

They’re somewhere in the 1990s, at the moment, staying in an eye-poppingly fancy hotel suite that they definitely won’t be paying the check for when they leave. Five is covering the walls with his equations. Allison is learning to talk again, and doing gross things with Luther that Klaus doesn't care to know about. Diego is sharpening his knives. Vanya is mostly keeping to herself, although she now has the ability to turn a room completely silent when she speaks, even if her abilities are back to being mostly-repressed. Everyone is busy busy busy, trying to think up ways to reverse the apocalypse.

And Klaus? Klaus is working his way through the drinks cabinet. He’s clean, no drugs since the end of the world, but he’s not a nun. He knows that going completely cold turkey would be a recipe for relapse.

At least he's able to act as a medium for Ben, who's been able to contribute some pretty interesting ideas to their plans, now that his siblings actually _believe_ him when he tells them Ben is there. Ben is frowning a lot lately. At least, he always seems to be frowning whenever he looks at Klaus. Maybe Klaus looks as tired as he feels. He thinks that conjuring Ben in that theatre must have taken something out of him, because he’s pretty much ready to pass out at any given moment. Or maybe that’s part of the withdrawal. But he can’t sleep, because every time he drifts off he’s either woken by the explosions or the spirits, and he doesn’t know which is worse.

No - he knows what’s worse. The _good_ dreams are worse than both of them. Sometimes Klaus dreams of 1968, but not the ricochet of gunfire. He dreams of a strong jaw, and lips curved into a smile under his. He dreams of broad hands cupping his cheeks like he’s something gentle. Like they don’t know all the shitty things he’s done or all the disgusting places he’s been. Like he's something worth taking care of. Those dreams are the worst ones, because Klaus has to wake up and remember that it’s over, it’s gone, _he_'s gone. At least the guns-and-ghosts dreams don't tease him like that; they just plain suck.

So sleep isn’t all that appealing for Klaus. His muscles are aching pretty much all the time. Walking seems to take the energy of running. He’s at the ratty, strung-out point of withdrawal where he hates God for creating opioids when he knew that taking them away would do _this_ to a poor guy.

It’s hardly Klaus’ fault that he blacks out in a team meeting. One second he’s standing up, the next he’s on the floor with six faces are peering down at him. Klaus groans as he tries to get back to his feet. Luther has to pull him up, and almost tears Klaus' arm from his socket in the process.

“Jesus,” Klaus complains, massaging his shoulder and trying to act like his vision isn’t full of stars.

Luther frowns, looking Klaus up and down. “You’re lighter than you should be.”

“Now _that_ is rude. That kind of talk can make a guy feel self-conscious, you know.”

Allison is scribbling on her notepad. _When did you last eat?_

“I’m on a liquid diet.”

With that, he reaches for the glass of whiskey he had on the table, but Diego snatches it away.

“Okay, Klaus. I think we need to have a talk.”

Klaus sprawls back down on his couch and heaves a long sigh. “Oh, come on, guys. Haven’t you got more important things to talk about than this?”

He thought his siblings were long past trying to give him interventions. They tried, they really did, those first couple of years after he started using. Allison especially. Luther too, in his brusque, emotionally stunted way of his. They read the pamphlets and they dragged him along to the counselling sessions. But then time went on and Klaus never made an effort to change (he’s pretty sure they would all take drugs too, if they had ghosts in their head) and his siblings gave up on ever trying to rehabilitate him.

Until now, apparently.

“No, I think it’s about time we talked about this,” Diego says firmly, and Klaus wonders if he remembers finding him in that alleyway all those years ago. Diego never did come back. At least, not that Klaus remembers. The next thing he knew after passing out that night was being in someone's apartment, so fucked up that even Ben was gone.

“Guys. I appreciate the concern. I really do. But I actually don’t need this talk right now.” He spreads his hands. “I’m sober.”

Allison raises her eyebrows pointedly at the whiskey.

“Sober from the other stuff.”

“You’re still obviously in bad shape from something,” says Diego, folding his arms emphatically. _God_, Klaus has never met anyone who folds their arms as emphatically as Diego.

“Wow. The compliments just keep coming today, don’t they?”

“This is serious, Klaus,” says Five. “We all need to be ready for when the fight comes.”

“You need to take better care of yourself,” says Luther.

That does it. That’s the last straw. Klaus laughs. He laughs and laughs and laughs, until it’s long stopped being funny, not that it really was in the first place.

“Wow,” he says eventually, breathless, when they’re all looking at him like he’s a lunatic. “Thank you for that _incredible_ advice, Luther. Truly enlightening. Eight stays in rehab, and no one’s ever told me that before.”

They all stare at him, and it’s so, _so_ obvious that they don’t get it. They don’t get even a fraction of it. Klaus is done with this.

It's so frustrating, because he's actually trying this time. Damn it, Klaus is trying _so _hard to stay clean. He doesn’t think he’s ever tried like this before. He doesn’t even know why he's trying this hard, really. Maybe it’s something to do with the fact that they’re all here again – all seven of them – and he never thought that would happen. Maybe it’s because of Ben. His brother is finally able to interact with the world again, and he seems less dead every day, and Klaus and Ben, they’re kind of a package deal. If Klaus gives up, if he resigns himself to a life of self-medicating, Ben loses his voice as well. He’d just be… he’d just be _stuck_ there, screaming in the wind with no one to hear him. Klaus might be an asshole but he’s not _that_ much of an asshole. Not to Ben, anyway.

And fuck, maybe Klaus is doing it for himself, as well. When they told him to stay in the lobby, a part of him recoiled. He went to war, didn’t he? It wasn’t all secret parties and stolen kisses. He did his time crawling through the mud; yes sir no sir. It feels like half a dream now. But when he dreams, he finds himself disassembling and reassembling his rifle, piece by piece, and when he wakes he can still feel the weight of it in his hands. He’s older than all these fuckers, except Five; he has a year on them. Maybe he’s sick of being the lookout. Maybe he’s sick of being the useless one.

“I’m _trying_,” he says, and it comes out a lot wobblier than he intended. Klaus bites down on his lip. Screw this, he decides.

Running from the room probably isn’t the most mature thing to do. But he doesn’t go far, only to the suite’s kitchen, where he throws a couple of oranges around in the air to give his hands something to do. A long time ago, a guy in prison taught him to juggle, except he did it with little plastic prison knives.

“Do you remember playing hide-and-seek?” Klaus asks, when Five appears at his shoulder. “Back at the Academy?”

“No. You never let me play.”

“Oh. Right, right. In our defence, being able to teleport out of your hiding place _is_ an unfair advantage.”

“I remember.” Vanya might now be the most powerful person on the planet now or whatever, but she still has the ability to slide into a room like a shadow. “You broke into Dad’s office that one time. The wall panel…”

“Ah," Klaus smiles nostalgically. "My finest work.”

They think they're being subtle. Luther, Allison, Diego. Sidling into the room like they just happen to be coming in here. Klaus groans inwardly. He guesses they’re really doing this, then. He throws an orange to Diego, who spears it with one of his knives instead of catching it; no less than Klaus expected. It's always fun to see how Diego can quickly conjure knives out of thin fucking air. Diego probably thinks it's tough and impressive, but Klaus mostly does it because it makes Ben laugh.

Speaking of Ben...

“He’s right there, you know," says Klaus, nodding at Luther's left shoulder.

“Who?” Luther swivels.

“Who do you think?”

Luther’s expression changes. “Ben? Do you mean… all those times you said he was there…?”

“Yep,” says Klaus, popping a piece of orange into his mouth. “Bet you feel like a dick now, huh?”

“Look, Klaus,” says Five. “I know I haven’t been around for the last seventeen years. So I don’t know exactly what’s been going on with you. But if we’re committed to this, to stopping the apocalypse, all seven of us need to be on our form. That includes you.”

If they were going for tactful and sympathetic, Klaus thinks, letting Five speak probably wasn't the best idea. Allison seems to think the same, because she gives Five an elbow, and then slides her notepad towards Klaus. _Worried about you_, she writes. _You’re our brother_. A pause, and then she adds:_ d__umbass._

Klaus licks his lips. “I am actually trying,” he says. “I - I know I’ve been an asshole in the past, okay? I shouldn’t have taken that money from you, Allison, and Luther, I should never have stolen your watch—”

“You stole my—?”

“—but I swear, I’m trying this time. Really.” Klaus swallows hard. Yeah, he guesses they're really, actually doing this. He presses his fists into his eye sockets, until everything goes nice and colourless and static. “My thing. My power. You guys - you know it’s not like yours, right? I can’t just turn it off and on. If I let them in, I let _all_ of them in. The ones like Ben. And the ones like the old guy over there, who’s hanging from the ceiling lamp, by the way.”

Luther turns, like there’s gonna be anything there if he looks. “What – there?”

“Yeah,” says Klaus, wishing he’d brought some whiskey. “There.”

Diego has stopped cutting his orange, Allison’s eyes have gone very round and very wide. Klaus thinks, for the first time in his life, that they might be starting to get it.

“Then let us help,” says Vanya softly. “I’m new to my abilities as well. I don’t really know what I’m doing. And I’m kind of scared I might break the world again.” She laughs nervously; it’s so easy to forget that Vanya caused the apocalypse. “I’d feel a lot better if I wasn't trying to work it all out on my own."

Allison is nodding furiously. _I'm trying to work out how to use my powers all over again too_, she writes. _Can't we do it together?_

Well, fuck. When his sisters ask like that, who is Klaus to say no?

There’s still so much they don’t know. So much fucked up shit that happened when they were kids, and even more that happened when they were adults. Some of it he remembers; a worrying amount, he doesn’t. The mausoleum, the drugs, the ghosts, _Dave_… those things are knotted at the back of his throat like a rotten apple core that Klaus can’t spit out but can’t swallow either, ‘cause he knows they’ll poison him if he keeps them inside any longer.

But Klaus is trying. His siblings are trying too. And maybe that’s the best they can do, for now.

“Okay,” says Klaus. Then he claps his hands together. "O_-kay_. I think that’s enough feelings for one day, don't you agree?”

The atmosphere in the room is one of fervent relief. Still, when most of the others have left, Diego launches forwards and yanks him into a hug.

“Whoa, there,” Klaus winces. “Sure you put enough _man_ into that man-hug, Diego? Think there’s a couple of my ribs you didn’t manage to bruise with that one.”

“Do you ever stop being a dick?”

“I take breaks on national holidays. Mark your calendar. What’s the next one, Veterans Day? What month are we in? Fuck, what year are we in?” He glances across at Five. “I don’t know how you keep track.”

“You get used to it.”

With that, Klaus considers the Emotional Sibling Moment to be officially adjourned, and heads for the liquor cabinet. But when Diego catches him by the shoulders and steers him back towards the kitchen instead, when he pushes Klaus into a seat and starts to make sandwiches, Klaus doesn’t resist.

He throws his sandwich crusts at Ben, to wipe that stupid smile off his face.

**Author's Note:**

> if u leave a comment i will love you forever xoxo


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